Wednesday, March 28, 2012

Resignation Part 2

During the decision making process of my resignation I clearly heard God say "follow me." Now sometimes I question myself, like was that God or was that my subconscious. I truly believe it was God because everywhere I looked, read, things I heard all said the words "follow me." So, no coincidence, it was God.

I kept asking God to say it to me again, speak it to me one more time, so I could find comfort in knowing I was honoring him. When I gave my official resignation I felt completely at peace and I was calm. Things I am usually not when making tough choices and meeting with people to deliver news. I usually get all nervous and make no sense, but all the words flowed right out of my mouth and peace swept over me. I was on a spiritual high for a couple of days, then all of a sudden I had that "OH MY WORD...WHAT DID I JUST DO?!" moment.

Again, I am not one to leave something without a plan or something else lined up. But I had nothing and still have nothing. All along I heard God whisper "follow me." At times I have said okay God, I am following, I don't know where I am going, but I am following. Faith is one of my spiritual gifts, but I gift it to others, not myself. I believe God will do and can do awesome, amazing things, but sometimes I have trouble believing that for myself. I know he can work in your life, but in mine, wow, that's hard to believe sometimes. So this whole blindly following thing is really hard for me. I want to be obedient to God, but I also know I need to be proactive on my end. So it's a tough balance for me.

Two weeks ago I was mulling through things in the car, and out of nowhere in my head I heard "don't you trust me?" I was like whoa, where did that come from, and again "don't you trust me?" It was the Lord again, hitting me upside the head, hello, why wouldn't he take care of me?! So I had to sheepishly answer, yes, Lord, I trust you. I told you all this has been hard!

I feel like through the resignation process I have also gone through the whole grief process, too.

D- denial

A- anger

B- bargaining

D- depression

A- acceptance

I have hit every single ones of those and repeated some. The denial for me was, sure I can do this job, just suck it up and keep working. I lied to myself for a long time, and put on a show for others, but really who was I kidding, no one. I was angry more with myself, feeling like a failure. I would look at other ministry couples and think they can do it, why can't we? I would get mad at myself for not trying harder, not getting enough done, for forgetting simple things. I would beat myself up over and over again. Bargaining probably was the one I didn't do too much of, because once I realized I needed to be obedient to God, I didn't try and pull okay I will do this for you, if you do this for. I don't play that game with God. Depression...oh yes, my good friend depression. I am not your typical depressed person that can't get out of bed. I am a functioning depressed person if there was such a thing. I can do the daily tasks and chores, but I am not joyful, nor am I really pleasant to be around. I yelled at my kids, I would cry all the time, I would get down super easy. I am actually still dealing with this one, but the good days have been more then the bad the last week or so. And finally acceptance. That's where I am I at today. I have completely accepted the fact that I am no longer on staff at a church, that I truly feel that I did what was best for my family in the season of life that we are in, and more importantly, I have totally accepted that I did what God wanted me to do.

For me I am also grieving certain memories of my job. When I took this job I gave up my full-time stay at home mom position. I left Molly in order to do this job. I had a terrible miscarriage while doing this job, but I also got the surprise of my life when I got pregnant with Lucy. All while I was doing my job. Okay, not like I got pregnant doing my job, but you know what I mean :)

So it's not just the fact that I walked away willingly, or that I will miss the kids, my team members, and parts of my job, it's that my life still was going on during my job, and we had lots of memories, hit lots of milestones all while I was doing this job. That's what grieves me the most.

Sometimes doing what God asks of us is really hard, I am living proof of that, again I am a wreck. But I look at it like this, God is wrecking me for some greater purpose, for some reason that hopefully one day I will find out why, but if I don't, at least I can be at peace knowing I did exactly what God asked me to do. As David Crowder once said "there always seems to be a ram in the bushes when you are obedient." I hope my ram comes soon, but if not, I am still following God.

4 comments:

Oh my goodness, Kate, I felt like I could feel your emotions as you went through describing them. These big changes are always hard and you are so right to describe it as grieving. When mom died I also quit and so I went through grieving her and grieving my independence and friends and all that goes along with being a working mom. But, to distinctly hear from the Lord - oh my goodness what a gift He gives us when he does that!! This upcoming journey is going to be amazing. I just know it!!

When God called me to leave vet school, I also heard and read "follow me" everywhere I turned. My pride has taken a serious beating from dropping the proof of my education. I'm praying for you in this transition.

"Sometimes doing what God asks of us is really hard, I am living proof of that, again I am a wreck. But I look at it like this, God is wrecking me for some greater purpose, for some reason that hopefully one day I will find out why, but if I don't, at least I can be at peace knowing I did exactly what God asked me to do."